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Help to settle debate

I have my journeymans license, I got a few months ago, but I am no longer in the field. I did some install work, some service and now do insurance. I know very little about commercial. I talked to my friend yest who mostly does PM on commercial equipment. I asked how was your week...he said busy doing PMs on a 10,000sq ft restaurant. Just for converstaion I asked how big were the units. He said they had 7 ten-ton carrier water to air heat pumps? I said 70 tons seems like a lot, he told me I didnt know what I was talking about, and I kinda dropped it. I was just thinking....Do restaurants really use that much tonage? Just seems crazy...but who knows? Anyone service restaurants...like a typical stekhouse type?

I could be anything, really. An olive garden in Florida isn't going to have the same sizes or even types of equipment as an identical building in Arizona.

Sometimes people use an assortment of smaller units that they can hide behind a parapet instead of one the size of a school bus on the roof. Sometimes you have a dining room with one unit that runs all the time, and another one that only kicks on when they're having a party with a bunch of people.

Friend of mine opened a little pizza joint. 1000 sq ft building, only windows are on the west. Came with a new 3 ton split. Landlord said that would be fine. HA. We added 5 tons to it and in 90+ weather, 8 tons doesn't do it when busy. We do have the 2nd unit as stage 2 so it comes on when the little guy can't keep up.

I could be anything, really. An olive garden in Florida isn't going to have the same sizes or even types of equipment as an identical building in Arizona.

Sometimes people use an assortment of smaller units that they can hide behind a parapet instead of one the size of a school bus on the roof. Sometimes you have a dining room with one unit that runs all the time, and another one that only kicks on when they're having a party with a bunch of people.

The 10,000 square foot could mean 500 to 600 people in there, ventilation without heat/energy recovery could easily eat up half of that 70 tons. Makes a difference where you are and how humid it is. People be another 20 to 25 tons.

Last edited by Carnak; 01-25-2007 at 01:59 PM.

The way we build has a greater impact on our comfort, energy consumption and IAQ than any HVAC system we install.

Looks like he was right. I guess the restaurant business is a whole different game. Would someone care to guess what size or how many units a typical Outback type place would have on there roof? seats about 250? With and w/out energy recovery units?

I do an Outback

I take care of many places that this isnt unreasonable
the Outback here has 8 ten ton carriers and when the restaurnat is full of people it can be stuffy after several hours, also there isnt an smoking ban yet that is another factor, lastly with 10% make up air your load goes up, they have 30 tons in the kitchen and its hot in there from the vent a hood system drawing it out as fast as it goes in.
i hae seen Cracker Barrels with 10 units 7.5 tons and up
abmittedly they stage under lighter loads but yep high load its fair

there's no debate

I don't see a debate. My first job we had the tri county area red lobster & olive gardens which here were owned by the same company. They were all 7-10 units anywhere from 7.5 -10 ton units. you do a manual J or one of the newer programs on a pc add in all the details.ALL the details! (biggest problem people have sizing equipment these days is skipping the small things)
and size with that.. only we any of us could agree or disagree is to be there ourselves and give our own awnser....

Thanks...that exhaust and make up air makes sense. What size units say olive garden, outback size be...any guesses? Would they have something as big as 10 tons or several 7.5 tons?

I've done chain restaurants and 70 tons is not out of line. Pack a couple hundred people into a relatively small area on a saturday night in the summer and you bet you'll need every bit of that tonnage and sometimes more. Different size stores will have different size equipment on them. It sounds like your friends site is a smaller store if the largest units are 10 ton.

One of my restaraunt chain stores has 15 RTUs, 9 exhaust fans, 3 MUAs, and 2 grease fans. Better than 1/2 of the RTUs are 20 to 24 tons each. This site is uncommon but it is an eating establishment.

I service an Applebees they have 4 7 and a half ton units and a five ton. So thats 35 tons all RTU'S. Plus they have a mua unit with a gas option. No evaporative option. I am not sure about their footprint but it is probably under 10000 sq ft

Commercial Restaraunts

It's all we do. We don't do anything else. It's our specialty and we run all the time. 70 tons is not out of the way, it's common. Heck we even a couple of stores with 50 tons of cooling on the MAU's and over 200,000 Btu of heat. They typically feed the kitchen right by the all the hoods. It's (the MAU) sized for 80% of the grease fan CFM's. If you get a chance to work on them, try, you'll like it.